


In a Raging Storm of Inevitable Flight

by aimingarrows



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: AU, Drama, Fantasy, Friendship, Gen, Slight Johnlock - Freeform, Wing!lock
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-10-15
Updated: 2013-10-15
Packaged: 2017-12-29 12:02:12
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,576
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1005188
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/aimingarrows/pseuds/aimingarrows
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"Sherlock never wants to let go, will never let go, because when John was there, the prospect of flying seemed almost as easy as breathing." </p>
<p>In a world where Sherlock can see wings, his view on life changes significantly, especially regarding one very special doctor.</p>
            </blockquote>





	In a Raging Storm of Inevitable Flight

It wasn't until Sherlock was five that he realized he was the only one who could see the wings.

He had never mentioned it out loud, despite his tendencies to do so, but little Sherlock Holmes had always been entranced by the bright colours and the fluttering feathers of the magical arms. And silently, when the night was cold and the fire in the hearth was burning brightly, sometimes Sherlock would brush a hand across his own growing wings, wondering ever so quietly when they'd be strong enough for him to fly.

He realized he was different when, on a particularly scary evening scattered with thunderstorms, he tried to grab Mycroft's wings out of fright.

His hands fell through air when the wings retracted, but Mycroft's shudder did not go unnoticed.

Maybe it seemed to be enough of an explanation as to why his mother would fondly ask him why he was staring at her back, or why his father would stare at him in wonder when Sherlock was smoothing out the feathers in his small wings.

So little Sherlock Holmes decided to keep his mouth shut, leaving his wings to splay out as far as they could in the evening, while keeping them tucked in close to his body during the day, always wondering why whenever he tried, he could not take off and fly.

* * *

His mother's wings were a bright violet, taking after her name, and they stretched to a full diameter of eight feet whenever she'd parade around during parties, full of pride and beauty, and Sherlock would not call her anything but that.

His fathers were an ash-brown, but he had never spread his wings to their full diameter, however Sherlock knew they were big and that was good enough for him. He also noted briefly, that there seemed to be flecks of black splattered on the tips of the feathers.

Mycroft's were wide in ten feet diameter in what seemed to be a royal blue colour, fitting enough for a man who aspired to be part of the British government. He held them out in pride in almost every waking moment, and sometimes even, whenever Mycroft would puff out his chest, the wings seemed to stretch even farther. His wings were beautiful, as much as Sherlock hated to admit it.

Sherlock was never able to stretch his wings. They were dull and grey, and nothing special.

But Sherlock knew he was special, so he did nothing more to dwell on that.

* * *

As he grew and life went on, Sherlock noted that his mother's wings were turning grey, like the ash that falls off a cigarette, while his father's wings were beginning to shrivel up against his body, tight and compact and almost afraid to be seen. Sherlock says nothing about the ash-brown feathers scattering the house, afraid that if he touches them, he might burn.

Everyone looks like angels, but Sherlock knows for sure that he is not one of them.

* * *

On the streets, Sherlock sees wings that span from four feet to eleven feet long, loud and boisterous and proud in their own skin, fluttering and quivering when they brush up against another's.

There are some wings that cover their owner's body, shielding them from the cruelness of the world, and when Sherlock saw an old woman's wings cover her body for the first time when he was ten, he thought that maybe he should do the same thing (no one likes him anyway, so he might as well disappear).

Sherlock Holmes is ten when he shields himself from the world using his wings.

(They are still grey.)

* * *

He never mentions it to anyone, even after finding out that he was different, but Sherlock Holmes would rather be hated for being clever than for being a freak.

(But as it turns out, being clever qualifies for being a 'freak,' too.)

* * *

Sherlock is sixteen when Mycroft's wings become a deep diamond blue, like the crown jewels in the Tower of London.

Sherlock is seventeen when his own wings turn black, poisoned from the cocaine and the darkness that has consumed him.

(Black is, after all, the colour of death.)

* * *

In University, he notices that different people have wings based on their persona. And Sherlock notes, in wonderful glee, that Sebastian Wilkes has wings that only span six feet.

(Sherlock doesn't know how big his wings are, they still don't spread, but they are certainly bigger than that.)

There are some that look like bird wings and have feathers, and others that look like reptiles and have scales, and based on deduction, Sherlock knows that the feathers belong to the angels and the scales belong to the demons.

Sherlock Holmes has feathers, but he has no idea why.

* * *

When Sherlock is twenty four, his feathers are falling.

He notes, with inescapable disgrace, that he will never be able to fly.

* * *

Rehab is nothing short of grim. The walls are white and blank, like a canvas lacking paint.

Sherlock's eyes, once aquamarine and clearer than the sky, are now haunted and darker than the ocean. His already fair skin is paler now, and the feathers on his wings are shedding one by one, like a sickness that is spreading.

All the other patients have wings that are black, like his, but the only difference is that they can spread out, and look strong enough to take flight.

He wants to fly, so he'll get better just for that.

(He leaves the building like a blank canvas, much like the walls of the rehab center.)

* * *

Lestrade's wings are like an eagle's, wide and strong and big, with a span of thirteen feet. The colours are brown and gold and white, bold and resilient much like the man himself. But he keeps them tucked in most of the time, only to be released whenever on a crime scene, splayed out like he is almost ready to take flight.

Sherlock's wings have become a dark grey, healing from the black poison and regaining their monochromatic colour.

Sherlock also records that his wings seem to quiver whenever he's on a crime scene, like they're waiting to be set free after a very long time.

He's just waiting for the day when they finally are.

* * *

Mrs. Hudson's wings are small and frail, like an elderly mother bird taking care of her young ones. They shudder and flutter when she walks around the flat, always buzzing and always moving, like the job of a mother is never done.

The flat she shows is perfect and dim with Victorian wallpaper and a wooden floor. It's big and a little expensive, even with the price down, but the place is just so perfect and so  _Sherlock_ that he can't let it go.

He ventures to go find a flatmate.

The emptiness of the flat is too much for him to handle, even though he acts like it doesn't bother him.

* * *

The day starts off well enough – Sherlock moves his stuff to the flat, unpacks his beloved things and easily takes a taxi to Barts.

He sees Mike Stamford in the cafeteria grabbing a cup of coffee, and makes easy chatter because the man started a conversation, and Sherlock accidently slips in the fact that he's been looking for a flatmate.

Then Mike leaves and Sherlock meets up with Molly in the morgue. Her wings are nine feet and dainty, and they're multi-colored with flecks of light green and light blue. Her wings flutter and bristle whenever Sherlock comes near, and they tuck in and cower whenever he accidently makes a remark. But Molly's a nice girl, so whenever Sherlock sees her, her wings never seem to cease fluttering.

And then his life gets turned upside down.

He is stunned when John Watson walks in the room, because the man's wings are nothing short of beautiful.

White and glowing, like an angel sent from heaven, Sherlock has never seen such a pure white before in his life.

He glances at his own grey wings and frowns. They pale in comparison.

And it's such a shame – John was such a  _boring_ name.

* * *

John is broken and fragmented, but his wings would prove that wrong. They span thirteen feet, larger than any Sherlock has seen and as big as Lestrade's.

Sherlock thinks that the bigger the wings, the bigger the heart.

He still covers his body with his wings, and ever so slightly, day by day, Sherlock feels like his wings can finally stretch (he doesn't know why they can't).

But John comes to the flat, his white wings a stark contrast to the dim light of the room and the macabre feeling with the skull in the corner, but Sherlock feels more at home than ever.

Sherlock is thirty years old when his wings are finally back to grey.

* * *

John's wings, though beautiful, stay compact to the body of the soldier. Sherlock had only ever seen them flex to their full span once – when he deduced him in the lab at Barts. They had trembled and quivered, not in an angry way, but startled, like when a mother realizes that her child has fallen and scrapped their knees.

He keeps his wings the way Sherlock does – covering his body, like an impenetrable suit of armor.

He is as broken as Sherlock is.

(And for the first time in a long time, Sherlock doesn't feel quite so alone.)

* * *

Sherlock is watching the lights of London flicker by when John calls him amazing. He is half waiting for the blow when John calls for the cab to stop to get out and never come back, but that blow never comes.

And, ever so slightly, Sherlock can feel his wings stretch.

* * *

For some reason, despite his wings, Sherlock had never needed to cut slits into the back of his clothes, nor has he seen anyone else doing the same thing. He merely puts on his shirt and buttons his suit, and his wings simply break through the cloth like a ghost walking through a wall.

He thinks it's strange, but it saves a lot of questions.

(John will never find out what a freak he really is.)

Sometimes, Sherlock feels like it would be worth it if he could fly. (But he can't, so what's the point?)

* * *

When they are running through the streets of London using the map in Sherlock's head, the first thing the detective notices isn't the traffic nor the cars, but rather, the way John runs, like an angel getting ready to fly.

His wings are beautiful under the moonlight, and Sherlock's are nothing but a fading entity against the dark sky. But he supposes that it's okay, he'd much rather act like nothing was different about him anyway.

He acts prideful, walking around the streets of London with his chest puffed out and his head held high, but he isn't, because Sherlock Holmes is the only person that knows that wings are in fact, covering his body. The only reason Sherlock walks around like that is to pretend that his own wings are spread out (it's the only ever time that he acts like Mycroft).

But there is pride in his soul, because apart from seeing the wings, Sherlock does have another gift – the gift of sight and observation. Sometimes, it gets him into trouble.

But this time, it was entirely worth it.

(Jennifer Wilson's wings were pink with black veins.)

Because almost getting killed prompted John to kill  _for_ him. And, as macabre as that sounds, it was the first time that Sherlock felt like someone thought his life was worth something.

(It made John feel valuable, so he doesn't cover his body anymore.)

So they come back home to 221B Baker Street, and John, somewhat shaken, goes upstairs to his bedroom and collapses on his bed.

They don't talk about the cabbie that night. In fact, it was almost as if it had never happened.

That is, until Sherlock wakes up the next morning with his wings fully extended.

* * *

He's not exactly sure why, and his mind is racing even more than usual, but Sherlock thinks that the key for spreading his wings was indisputably  _John._  Just John and his being, his presence, his bravery and his cunningness to trust  _Sherlock Holmes_ of all people.

It made him feel special. It made him feel more than just a man.

(Sherlock thinks John is his angel and no one else can convince him otherwise.)

* * *

It is on a Monday that John notices that something is amiss.

"Why are you looking at my back?" he asks, perplexed with his head twisted around to look behind him.

Sherlock shrugs and presses down the feeling of dread from being caught, "Nothing."

"No, seriously, why?" John urges, "You always do this. I see you looking at people's backs on the streets. You never look at their faces when they talk to you, you always look past them, like there's something on their back."

Sherlock places his cup of tea back on the table gently, his wings retreating back into his body, wrapping around him like a protective cloth. "It's nothing, John."

"I don't think it's nothing." John's wings bristle.

"It is nothing. I do believe you're late for work."

John glances at the clock on the mantelpiece above of the fireplace, noting with dismay that he is, indeed, fifteen minutes late for work.

So he leaves, his wings brushing up against Sherlock's so lightly that it makes Sherlock shiver. John doesn't see this, however, because he's already out the front door.

Sherlock watches him walk away from the window, realizing that John's wings are the ones that stand out the brightest in a city of a million people.

* * *

When Sherlock drifts in the land of reality, his mind races up a storm.

And even when he sleeps, his mind is as restless as ever, but of an entirely different kind of energy.

He dreams of angels and demons fighting battles, knocking down buildings and flying through clouds. He dreams that the world is ending at the hands of those who were meant to protect it, but the world ends slowly, like the way the sun sets at dusk.

And sometimes, more than frequently, Sherlock dreamed of flying.

* * *

When someone asks Sherlock what he thinks of games, he would tend to reply by saying that it would depend what type of game he was to play.

It was safe to say that Jim Moriarty's game was new and exciting, and something that Sherlock had always dreamed to playing.

It was electric and fast and stimulating, and Sherlock had never felt more physically alive.

He was like a hurricane tearing through desperate grounds, but his mind was infinitely more destructive than any typhoon.

That is, until he saw John strapped to a bomb.

His once white wings were wilted, much like a flower out of season and plucked from its home, drained from water and sunshine. The white was slowly becoming a sickly grey, and out of anger, Sherlock's wings flexed angrily to their full size.

He had never done that before, they had stretched, but never to their full capacity.

And Sherlock notes, with undeniable shock, that his wings are sixteen feet long.

(He doesn't know what this means, but he thinks that maybe he can fly.)

In the light of the pool and the moonlight, Sherlock's wings don't look grey, but rather, silver, and for one second, Sherlock thinks that he looks beautiful.

But Moriarty's wings are anything but that. They are not feathery, but not scaly, they are, in fact, nothing like Sherlock has ever seen before. They are bat wings, with leathery skin stretched between the bones, and pure black with the veins barely visible past the skin. The wings are horrifying, and they are twelve feet long.

Then Sherlock falters, just for a moment, and realizes that Moriarty is  _not_ looking at his eyes, but at something on his back.

Oh.  _Oh._

He can see them too.

But neither mentions it, merely parading around the issue much like the sidestepping that Sherlock does to avoid stepping on people's wings, and Moriarty lets them go.

(John is shaken, and his white wings are losing their feathers.)

Sherlock knows that nothing will ever be the same, not if someone else could see the wings, too.

* * *

Irene Adler is beautiful, just like her wings. Blood red and white, they stretch to ten feet long, and their movement is as sultry and seductive as the woman herself.

But her wings are not the most beautiful that Sherlock has seen.

It is still John's. Always John's.

But Sherlock isn't the most observant man in the world for nothing, and although John's wings are not changing, his are.

They are no longer grey, but turning silver with each passing day. Black wingtips and silver feathers, Sherlock notices that the change started to happen the day John walked into his life.

When he spreads them out on the roof of 221B Baker Street, he swears they look like the armor of a knight.

(He no longer covers his body.)

* * *

"I don't have friends. I've just got one."

It was perhaps, maybe, the most honest thing that Sherlock had ever confessed. No, he wasn't used to relying on someone else, nor admitting that he actually  _had_ someone to rely on, but the prospect of losing John to something so trivial as a mistaken conversation hurt  _so much_ that it made Sherlock sick.

Sherlock never wants to let go, will  _never let go,_ because when John was there, the prospect of flying seemed almost as easy as breathing.

* * *

The journey home from Dartmoor was tense, much like the air whenever they had a 'domestic' as Mrs. Hudson would call it, but far worse.

"You've never been afraid before, have you?" John asks quietly, his head leaning against the window pane of the train, wings wrapped around his body securely.

Sherlock falters for a second, wondering if it was the right time to tell John that he lived in constant fear of being abandoned, of never being able to fly.

"No."

"It's alright to be afraid, Sherlock. It makes you human."

(Sherlock doesn't want to be human.)

"I didn't realize I wasn't one in the first place," Sherlock replies tersely.

John frowns deeply, a crease appearing on his forehead and his wings bristling absentmindedly. "I never said you weren't, Sherlock. What I meant by that was because you always seemed so determined to act detached from your emotions that it reaches a point where people wonder whether or not you have any at all."

"I am a sociopath. I have no need for human emotions."

John growls in frustration, throwing up his arms in the air and his wings spreading wildly. "You are  _human_ , Sherlock, it is okay to be afraid! Having emotions isn't a bad thing!"

Sherlock's wings tremble, but his face shows no outward emotion. "Sentiment."

There's a slam on the table separating them, and Sherlock looks away from the window to see John's eyes flaring and his chest puffing out, his wings spread out angrily around their quarters. "Do you know what the problem is with you, Sherlock?"

"What?"

"You talk about humanity in such a disregard that you forget you're not a god."

(No, he's not a god. But he's not an angel, either.)

* * *

Jim Moriarty comes back to their lives almost two years after he left them by the side of the pool.

Sherlock prepares two cups of tea, and waits patiently for him to arrive.

And then he does, but this time, neither tip-toe over the issue of the wings.

"I want to solve the problem. Our problem. The final problem," Moriarty hums, "It's going to start very soon, Sherlock. The fall," Moriarty's wings shiver and expand, draping over the back of the seat.

"But don't be scared. Falling's just like flying except there's a more permanent destination."

It's in an unsung conversation that is exchanged between Sherlock Holmes and Jim Moriarty that they talk about the wings, and why, for some reason, they are not able to fly.

(But Sherlock needn't be scared, falling  _is_ just like flying.)

* * *

Sherlock had never liked heights.

When he was twelve, he fell of a tree when he tried to jump off and fly, and when he was twenty-six, he fell off a fire escape when in pursuit of a serial killer.

So, no, Sherlock Holmes didn't like heights.

But he didn't expect anything less from Jim Moriarty.

No, they were just alike – clever and powerful with the ability to see the wings. But there is a fine line between genius and insanity, and Moriarty clearly sees that.

"But you're boring," he takes a glance at Sherlock's feathery wings, "you're on the side of the angels."

And Sherlock's wings quivered with an undeniable fervor, in anger or in flattery, he didn't know. But his wings were bigger than Moriarty's so he likes to think that he would have a higher chance of taking flight.

But then Sherlock remembers all that he has done, and all that has ever happened in his life, and realizes that no, he is no angel.

"I may be on the side of the angels, but don't think for one second that I am one of them," Sherlock bites back, and Moriarty's wings shudder in glee.

Then everything goes to hell and Moriarty's on the floor, blood seeping out from his head and decorating the tiled roof like a pattern in a maze with only one path. His eyes are dead, but not different from what they looked like in life, and lifeless, always so, so lifeless. The man himself had a dead soul. The bat-like wings are the only things left alive, moving so ungracefully, scampering about from underneath the body, trying to move, trying to fly, but failing nevertheless.

Then they stop, and everything is silent.

The people down below had never looked so tiny, they looked like ants.

(John still looked like a giant.)

But he has to do what he has to do.

(He knows he'll come back. But the concept of being a fraud just hurts  _so much_.)

Then there are tears falling down his face, and his arm is reaching out, wishing, hoping, for one more opportunity to touch John's own, and he can see him, reaching for him as well, but it is all a futile attempt worth nothing.

(In this moment, he wishes he could fly.)

But he falls off the roof, gracefully spreading his arms out to pretend that they are wings, waiting to take flight, but he is falling and falling and falling, and soon everything is dark and black, and the pavement is stained red with his blossoming blood.

(They look like roses.)

* * *

He stays at Molly's place for a week to tend his wounds, and before he knows it, he's out of London, out of the city he's known his entire life, and into the wild where the beasts run free.

Sherlock leaves the city in the dead of night and doesn't look back, with nothing but the pictures of those he loves in his coat pocket and his wings drooped sadly behind him.

(He covers himself again.)

* * *

It's a year and a half into tracing down Moriarty's web that Sherlock hears from his brother for the first time since he left London.

"John's a wreck. You need to come home. –MH."

Sherlock feels his heart pulse deeply inside his chest, and as he pulls his wings around him closer, he types in a simple two word reply.

"I can't. –SH."

* * *

In a twist of fate, Lestrade is the first person he sees.

In a cab on the way back into the city, a mirror to how he left, Sherlock is three years older and three years wiser, but his wings have slowly drifted back into grey. Lifeless, dull, like his life before John came into it.

John was his conductor of light, and without light, his wings cannot shine.

Lestrade sees him in the middle of the street at midnight, while walking back home from Scotland Yard.

His hair is shorter, Sherlock notes fondly, but his wings have dulled in colour. No longer bright like they once used to be, when he was at his prime before Sherlock fell.

(Sometimes, Sherlock liked to think that he was a fallen angel.)

Age and stress had not been kind to Detective Inspector Lestrade.

(He's not a DI anymore, apparently. Not since Kitty Riley's expose.)

"Inspector…" Sherlock begins.

By then Sherlock feels suffocated and crowded, and the only things he can register is the body curled around his and the wings that are brushing against his own.

And, for the first time, Sherlock doesn't hesitate to reciprocate a hug.

"You stupid sod, I thought you were dead," a tiny whisper comes from the silver-haired man.

(Lestrade's wings glow brighter after that.)

* * *

Mrs. Hudson sobbed, initially in disbelief and then in pure and utter gratitude, and her wings fluttered so erratically that Sherlock thought she was indeed going to get lifted off the ground.

"Oh, my boy," she sobbed as she clung onto his shirt, her tears soaking through the fabric, and her wings hugging him just as much as his were hugging her.

He was finally home, and that was better than anything.

* * *

He hadn't expected John to take it lightly, not in the slightest. What he didn't expect though, was for John to completely ignore him and go about his merry business.

The other man looked tired, his eyes, although only three years older, looked practically ten. His hair became slightly greyer, losing some of its blonde shade, and his wings –  _oh, his wings,_ were a light grey. Drained, dead and drooped. Nothing like the pure white Sherlock once laid his eyes on.

In fact, they almost looked like Sherlock's.

"John…" he murmured quietly, stunned at the sight of the man he'd be kept apart from for three years.

But the doctor merely looks up and graces a small, sad smile. "Hello, Sherlock."

There was no emotion in the voice, just pure, unadulterated emptiness.

"John…it's me. I'm back," Sherlock repeated, closing in on the doctor's form sitting in the armchair.

But John merely shakes his head. "No you're not. No one else can ever see you."

It takes Sherlock thirty three minutes and twenty six seconds to convince John that he is real and not a figment of his imagination.

When the realization dawns in on John's face, the emotion in his eyes and in the room is almost palpable.

John blinks once, twice and thrice innocently, like a child looking up at the night sky waiting for a shooting star to pass and make a wish. Then anger clouds his dark blue eyes, and Sherlock is on the floor with a stinging cheek and his quivering feathers splayed out from underneath him.

John's wings are spread wide and still, covering Sherlock's body in a dark shadow of menace and anger, but then the most unexpected thing happens, and the second punch never comes.

Instead, the third hug of the night occurs, and John is in Sherlock's arms, grabbing a hold of his shirt tightly with a fistful of fabric in his hand and tears soaking through Sherlock's shirt. The whole ordeal is messy and sentimental, but Sherlock finds that he doesn't mind.

His wings wrap around John's body, enveloping the two men in a clouded hug of feathers and unspoken words.

_I missed you. Please don't leave me. Not again. Never leave. You were my life. Promise me that you'll never leave me again?_

Sherlock tightens his arms around John, and in turn, John's wings absentmindedly wrap around Sherlock's body, brushing up against his once silver wings.

_I promise._

(Sherlock Holmes keeps his promises.)

* * *

It is four months and five days after Sherlock's return that John finally finds out about the wings.

Sherlock was on the roof, stretching his wings (they were finally back to silver, and no longer covering his body), when John burst through the door and flung himself towards the detective, clinging onto him tightly and pulling him towards the door.

"John! John!" Sherlock cried out in confusion, all the while trying to retract his wings back into his body.

"Not again, Sherlock,  _please,_ " John begged, " _not again._ Please don't come up here…I….I don't know if I can take it."

The doctor never looked so scared before in his life, nor so broken.

_Oh._

"John it's fine, I…I wasn't," Sherlock started, though he was silenced by John only mere seconds later.

"I  _know,_ Sherlock. But I can't. I can't," he repeated four more times in a whisper, collapsing on the ground in a heap of feathers.

Sherlock stared. The man looked lost and so,  _so_ scared. The now white wings were trembling and shaking, fluttering around on the ground in an urgent manner, as if trying to pick John up and put him back on his feet.

But John merely stayed seated on the ground, still and unmoving, like a statue.

"Please don't go on rooftops. I…I don't think I can handle it," John suddenly murmured, breaking the silence between the two men.

Sherlock knelt down on the ground and John looked up to see the detective's blue eyes staring at him. "I'm not going to jump, John."

"No…" John breathed heavily, "I know. I-It's jus –"

"I know. I'm sorry."

After a beat, John spoke up again. "What are you doing up here, anyway?"

So Sherlock told him everything.

Needless to say, what happened afterwards was a repeat of how they first met.

(Both their wings glow brighter than ever.)

* * *

It could have taken days, or months, or even decades for Sherlock to return to London, but there was absolutely no doubt in his mind that he, one day, would come back.

The city was his kingdom, as much as it was his prison. But the buildings and the lights and the history made it all worth the wait.

(John was there, too, so he had no choice but to come back.)

At night, when the city lights would burn bright against the skyline, Sherlock would often wonder if there was a reason that he couldn't fly.

He finds out the reason why a year and two months into his return.

To the city that he saved and to the city that turned its back, Sherlock Holmes soared back in during the dead of night, leaving nothing to chance and refusing to take 'no' for an answer.

The city believed in him again.

But his friends believed in him all along.

(His friends believing in him made him feel like he was flying.)

The city was his and full of angels, and, though the occasional demon, still remained as a heaven on top of a sea of clouds.

Just a city full of millions of people, and, to the ordinary eye, all those people looked like ants, busy and bustling and roaming about during the day and during the night, with nothing special about them at all.

But Sherlock Holmes was no ordinary man.

He didn't see people, he saw giants and stories and treasures. And above all, he saw angels walking in broad daylight.

He had a beautiful brain and a beautiful life, and to a great mind – nothing is little.

Before he had left, he had told John that heroes didn't exist. (He wasn't always right.)

But there are heroes. Maybe not in the conventional form that you would read in fairytales or comic books, but heroes nevertheless. (His friends are his heroes. They all count and he's always trusted them.)

His friends weren't just angels, but giants, too. However the sad thing is that you wouldn't take a second glance at these five people in a crowd, they would be nothing but just an ordinary face. But they were so much more than that.

To Sherlock – John, Molly, Lestrade and Mrs. Hudson were more than just a regular face.

To the city, however, they were just an ordinary face in the crowd with an extraordinary life.

(They will all continue to save them, because that's what angels do.)

So no, in a city full of a million giants, you would not take a second glance at these five people in a crowd, and if anything, you would forget about them in a split second.

But Sherlock Holmes wouldn't forget. He would never forget.

The initial days after the Fall were hard, but the years tracing Moriarty's network down changed him, and surprisingly, got him to see the world in a much  _clearer_ way.

There is nothing wrong with being an angel, so Sherlock accepts his grace with open arms and open wings, waiting for the day when he and his friends will take their steps into the sun, blessed and rewarded with the good deeds that they have done.

(Into the darkness they will soar until morning.)

He doesn't think he's perfect. He's made mistakes, he is no god. (He's accepted that now.)

No one else found out about the wings except for John, but that was alright, no one else ever needed to know.

London was his haven, his heaven, his home.

And although he couldn't fly, John and his friends were there, and to Sherlock Holmes, that was enough.

**Author's Note:**

> So that's done! I actually had a bit of trouble with the plot line and I know Sherlock is a tad bit OOC but that's because it's an AU and we're in his thoughts instead of just listening to his outward dialogue. So I hope it's not cringe-worthy or absolutely horrifyingly terrible.
> 
> Anyway, I hope you all liked it! Tell me what you think! Is it good? Is it bad? Your feedback means the world to me :D
> 
> To be honest, I have a bit of trouble with plotholes and the such, so if there is any that you spot, don't hesitate to tell me and I'll fix it right up! But the thing I'm most concerned about is if the story makes sense and if anything needs clarification :)
> 
> I also have a tendency of discussing the meaning of the title in my closing author's note, but In a Raging Storm of Inevitable Flight basically means that Sherlock's mind and body is like a storm, always moving and never still, and in this case, it's regarding the concept of flying and wings. The Inevitable Flight part is a reference to him discovering that although he couldn't fly physically, having his friends believe in him and accepting who he is, made him feel like he was flying. So when he accepted this, flight was inevitable.
> 
> Drop a comment dearest beautiful Sherlockians? :)
> 
> -DC
> 
> P.S. Have a cookie for reading!


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